Australian satirist, Bryan Dawe, has been duped by online scammers claiming to be a young female Palestinian photographer, whose gear had been purportedly destroyed in an Israeli bombardment of Gaza.
The Tangier-based Australian, a writer and artist best known for performing mock political interview skits with the late John Clarke, thought he was doing a good deed by using his profile to help replace the gear of fake photographer, Sarah Murtaja.
But it was later revealed that Murtaja’s photos were captured by other Gaza-based photographers, and the young Palestinian is probably a creation of a criminal syndicate. Dawe fortunately clued on to the scam moments before wiring the money away, enabling him to issue refunds, however the scammers sought revenge.
In May 2021 Dawe was moved by a heartfelt Facebook post written by the person, or people, claiming to be a young photojournalist asking for assistance to replace her destroyed photography gear. Her post included a picture of a smashed Canon 5D III and a note that Israel ‘prevented the introduction of financial aid into Gaza’, so she ‘created a donation campaign through PayPal, and I hope for the good people to donate even a little bit’.
The Facebook post garnered more than 269 shares and 600 comments, including several from individuals confirming they supposedly ‘donated’. The Sarah Murtaja profile is incredibly active, with numerous new posts each day showing ‘every day life’ in Gaza. There are hundreds of photos – possible more than a thousand – published since June 2021, and the account has over 1000 followers.
Read the article on Inside Imaging.